28 Jul, 2010, KaVir wrote in the 21st comment:
Votes: 0
Deimos said:
A stone golem is animate. Therefore, it's up to the designer as to whether he wants his stone golem to be immune to charm or not. As far as the system is concerned, a stone golem is animate, so it should be allowed to be charmed. A keep is not animate.

The typical interpretation of a golem is of a mindless creature - an automaton, much like a fantasy version of a robot. If a game allowed me to charm such a creature I would consider it just as silly as charming a keep. Actually I think it would be worse, because at least the keep wouldn't be able to move or talk, so the "charm" would effectively do nothing.

In most muds there's no restriction on what you can charm, so you can indeed charm golems, undead, animated swords, and pretty much any other mob you come across. I tend to view this with the same degree of detachment as chopping the legs off snails - it's kind of sloppy, not something I'd want in my own mud, but at the end of the day I recognise that not everyone is interested in the same degree of attention to detail as I am (which is fair enough).

Deimos said:
It makes no sense for a keep to be able to be charmed, whether the designer wants it so or not.

I guess I better scrap my plans for upgrading Baba Yaga's hut, then…

Deimos said:
So, in my system, an animated statue would be a Creature, but a normal statue would just be an Object.

That was my intention with the training dummy, too. It took me 4.5 years before I finally decided it worked better as a Creature, and changed it.
28 Jul, 2010, Scandum wrote in the 22nd comment:
Votes: 0
Deimos said:
As I pointed out before, though, there are ways to negate the undesirable functionality, but it just seems too much like trying to ram a square peg into a round hole to me :p I'd much rather move the functionality up the class hierarchy and keep things a little more logical.

What you mean is that it's easier to be illogical.

This because your pegs don't have shapes, so you can't check whether your holes are round or not, or for that matter, if your pegs are square or not. As such it's easier to call a square peg a mob, a round peg an object, and add different hammers while at it.

In a good model there is no undesirable functionality, imagine God ascending from the heavens telling nuclear scientists that atomic bombs are a bug, and not to use them until he fixes it. This comparison serves to show that in an increasingly complex world intelligence becomes increasingly important (scientists are smart) as behavior becomes exponentially more complex, and given the dominant egalitarian dogma that would be considered undesirable by most. So if you don't want to create a fundamentally imbalanced game (life ain't fair either) don't go there.

Another thing to consider is that players are typically godlike on MUDs, with that I mean they're mostly self sufficient entities. As power corrupts it's desirable if there's some kind of mechanism in place for players to depend on each other or police each other, preferably both. Permadeath combined with open PK is probably the most powerful tool available to achieve this.
30 Jul, 2010, Deimos wrote in the 23rd comment:
Votes: 0
KaVir said:
The typical interpretation of a golem is of a mindless creature - an automaton, much like a fantasy version of a robot. If a game allowed me to charm such a creature I would consider it just as silly as charming a keep. Actually I think it would be worse, because at least the keep wouldn't be able to move or talk, so the "charm" would effectively do nothing.

I don't really want to turn this into a philosophical discussion, but suffice it to say that you'd have a hard time convincing me that a robot doesn't have a mind. At least now I understand why you didn't see the difference as I did, though.

KaVir said:
In most muds there's no restriction on what you can charm, so you can indeed charm golems, undead, animated swords, and pretty much any other mob you come across. I tend to view this with the same degree of detachment as chopping the legs off snails - it's kind of sloppy, not something I'd want in my own mud, but at the end of the day I recognise that not everyone is interested in the same degree of attention to detail as I am (which is fair enough).

I agree with you on the snail-legs-type stuff, but I think charming of those types of creatures may be more of a difference of opinion than an oversight. Obviously you don't believe undead, golems, etc. have minds to be charmed, but are you so sure others don't disagree? I certainly do, and I'd find it hard to believe that I was the only one. Just something to keep in mind before attributing it to less attention to detail…

KaVir said:
I guess I better scrap my plans for upgrading Baba Yaga's hut, then…

Haha, touche, but I think we both know that's more of an exception than a rule. :p


@Scandum:
You totally lost me, lol.
31 Jul, 2010, KaVir wrote in the 24th comment:
Votes: 0
Deimos said:
I don't really want to turn this into a philosophical discussion, but suffice it to say that you'd have a hard time convincing me that a robot doesn't have a mind.

It's a machine. If a 'charm' spell works on a robot, then by the same reasoning it should also work on a laptop, a coffee machine, a DVD player, and so on.

Deimos said:
I agree with you on the snail-legs-type stuff, but I think charming of those types of creatures may be more of a difference of opinion than an oversight. Obviously you don't believe undead, golems, etc. have minds to be charmed, but are you so sure others don't disagree? I certainly do, and I'd find it hard to believe that I was the only one. Just something to keep in mind before attributing it to less attention to detail…

I can understand having spells for controlling undead, but it strikes me as silly for a regular 'charm' spell to work on a mindless automaton that's been animated though magic.

However charm was just one example, and from a building perspective the snail-legs would be handled in exactly the same way by my system. A golem/statue would have its "mind" set to "none", while a snail would have its "legs" set to "tail" (or "foot" or whatever you want to call it). Both properties would be part of the shape used by the creature.
31 Jul, 2010, Deimos wrote in the 25th comment:
Votes: 0
KaVir said:
It's a machine. If a 'charm' spell works on a robot, then by the same reasoning it should also work on a laptop, a coffee machine, a DVD player, and so on.

As far as I'm aware, the basic definition of "intelligence" or having a "mind" is the ability to perceive, reason, and make decisions. That's what I've been taught in AI classes, anyhow. An autonomous robot qualifies. A laptop could qualify depending on unmentioned factors. Your other examples don't. Surely you recognize the huge difference between an autonomous robot and a coffee machine?

KaVir said:
I can understand having spells for controlling undead, but it strikes me as silly for a regular 'charm' spell to work on a mindless automaton that's been animated though magic.

If it can perceive, reason, and make decisions, then I don't think it really matters what's actually driving it. Magic, programming, soul, brain, whatever you want to call it - it's a "mind" and I don't think it's a giant stretch to assume that that "mind" could be magically controlled by someone else.

KaVir said:
However charm was just one example, and from a building perspective the snail-legs would be handled in exactly the same way by my system. A golem/statue would have its "mind" set to "none", while a snail would have its "legs" set to "tail" (or "foot" or whatever you want to call it). Both properties would be part of the shape used by the creature.

Yeah, I understood this before. I was just curious to find out why you thought it was easier than displacing some of the behavior up the inheritance chain. I won't be taking the same route as you initially, but who knows - maybe after 4.5 years I'll come to the same conclusion you did. We'll see!
31 Jul, 2010, David Haley wrote in the 26th comment:
Votes: 0
Quote
If it can perceive, reason, and make decisions, then I don't think it really matters what's actually driving it. Magic, programming, soul, brain, whatever you want to call it - it's a "mind" and I don't think it's a giant stretch to assume that that "mind" could be magically controlled by someone else.

if (enemy_is_close) {
attack_enemy();
}

Is there any reasoning and proper decision-making here? There's perception, but it'd be a stretch to say there is proper intelligence.

Basically I think this just depends on what exactly you mean by "robot" – there are very simple robots, and then there is the hypothetical full artificially intelligent agent. In a sense you are both right: some robots could not be "charmed" any more than a pulley and lever system could be charmed; other autonomous agents could quite conceivably be charmed depending on what exactly their decision-making engine looks like.
31 Jul, 2010, KaVir wrote in the 27th comment:
Votes: 0
Deimos said:
As far as I'm aware, the basic definition of "intelligence" or having a "mind" is the ability to perceive, reason, and make decisions.

Please bear in mind that I did specifically refer to "a mindless creature - an automaton", the "robot" comment was just to compare it to the typical D&D-style fantasy golem: "Being mindless, they do nothing without orders from their creators. They follow instructions explicitly and are incapable of any strategy or tactics. They are emotionless in combat and cannot be provoked."

Deimos said:
That's what I've been taught in AI classes, anyhow. An autonomous robot qualifies. A laptop could qualify depending on unmentioned factors. Your other examples don't. Surely you recognize the huge difference between an autonomous robot and a coffee machine?

Yes - but it's a difference of scale. My Tassimo may not move around like a modern-day autonomous robot, but it does monitor water levels, read the bar codes on coffee discs to determine what to do with them, etc.
31 Jul, 2010, Deimos wrote in the 28th comment:
Votes: 0
David Haley said:
if (enemy_is_close) {
attack_enemy();
}

Is there any reasoning and proper decision-making here? There's perception, but it'd be a stretch to say there is proper intelligence.

I gave the standard definition of intelligence, and yes, this would apply. Note that something doesn't have to have complex intelligence to be considered intelligent by most experts. After all, there's a reason you still call a computer tic-tac-toe player an AI (emphasis on the I) opponent. And if a thing can make its own decisions based on its perceptions and reasoning, then it stands to reason that those decisions could be swayed by an outside influence, in my opinion.

David Haley said:
Basically I think this just depends on what exactly you mean by "robot" – there are very simple robots, and then there is the hypothetical full artificially intelligent agent. In a sense you are both right: some robots could not be "charmed" any more than a pulley and lever system could be charmed; other autonomous agents could quite conceivably be charmed depending on what exactly their decision-making engine looks like.

I'm pretty sure that the definition of robot is autonomy. If it can't make decisions, then it's not a robot, and not intelligent. Otherwise it is. Simple robots still have "minds" - albeit simple ones.

KaVir said:
Please bear in mind that I did specifically refer to "a mindless creature - an automaton", the "robot" comment was just to compare it to the typical D&D-style fantasy golem: "Being mindless, they do nothing without orders from their creators. They follow instructions explicitly and are incapable of any strategy or tactics. They are emotionless in combat and cannot be provoked."

I'm not very familiar with D&D, so I wasn't aware that this is how they classify golems. I have an issue with this, though. In most contexts, I find that golems do make their own decisions. In your game, do golems have a sorcerer controlling them at all times? If this is the accepted description, why do I most commonly see golems running around all by themselves making their own decisions just like any other NPC? Anyhow, if that's how you're defining golem, then I would completely agree that they couldn't be charmed.

KaVir said:
Yes - but it's a difference of scale. My Tassimo may not move around like a modern-day autonomous robot, but it does monitor water levels, read the bar codes on coffee discs to determine what to do with them, etc.

Then your coffee maker is intelligent, given the accepted definition of artificial intelligence. Shrug.
31 Jul, 2010, KaVir wrote in the 29th comment:
Votes: 0
Deimos said:
KaVir said:
Please bear in mind that I did specifically refer to "a mindless creature - an automaton", the "robot" comment was just to compare it to the typical D&D-style fantasy golem: "Being mindless, they do nothing without orders from their creators. They follow instructions explicitly and are incapable of any strategy or tactics. They are emotionless in combat and cannot be provoked."

I'm not very familiar with D&D, so I wasn't aware that this is how they classify golems.

Well golems originally came from Jewish folklore, and in many depictions they're portrayed in much the same way as D&D - perfectly obedient, following instructions to the letter.

Deimos said:
I have an issue with this, though. In most contexts, I find that golems do make their own decisions.

You mean in mythology, fantasy literature, or muds? I mean there are some famous stories about golem-like creatures that are intelligent, with "Frankenstein" being perhaps one of the most well known. But there are probably just as many stories in which the golems are mindless automatons, blindly following orders, and that's the way I've usually thought of them in muds.

Deimos said:
In your game, do golems have a sorcerer controlling them at all times?

They only exist in one area, and are the creation of an NPC magus. They generally guard his tower, with the occasional golem wandering loose in the nearby forest and attacking people on sight.

Deimos said:
If this is the accepted description, why do I most commonly see golems running around all by themselves making their own decisions just like any other NPC?

In my mud? You don't - those that wander around could be considered similar to the famous story of the Golem of Prague; when ordered to defend the Jews, it obeyed the command by killing everyone else (and just like that golem, the golems in my mud can also be deactivated by destroying the mark on their forehead).

In other muds? For the same reason a fully trained human warrior can engage in an evenly matched fight to death with a normal garden snail, finally killing it by slicing off one of its arms, then discovering a full-sized magic potion and a pile of gold coins in its corpse.

In most muds there's no real distinction between mobs. They're all pretty much the same, differing only in description and level. Few muds bother to introduce special behavior for different mobs.
31 Jul, 2010, Deimos wrote in the 30th comment:
Votes: 0
KaVir said:
In my mud? You don't - those that wander around could be considered similar to the famous story of the Golem of Prague; when ordered to defend the Jews, it obeyed the command by killing everyone else (and just like that golem, the golems in my mud can also be deactivated by destroying the mark on their forehead).

What you described last post made golems seem more like puppets than robots - inanimate objects that aren't capable of doing anything on their own, but can be magically controlled by someone else. That seems rational to me, even if I don't necessarily agree with it, but your comment here contradicts that description. Something without a mind can't be ordered. I can't order a puppet to dance. I can pull on its strings and make it dance myself, but that's not the same thing. Likewise, if a golem doesn't have a mind, a magus can't order it to go wander around and kill things. He could use magic to force it to wander around and kill things, like a puppet-master controlling a puppet, but again, that's not the same thing.

Edit: I meant to add that this just my opinion and what makes sense to me. I'm not trying to dictate how magical concepts should work in other people's games :p
01 Aug, 2010, KaVir wrote in the 31st comment:
Votes: 0
Deimos said:
What you described last post made golems seem more like puppets than robots - inanimate objects that aren't capable of doing anything on their own, but can be magically controlled by someone else. That seems rational to me, even if I don't necessarily agree with it, but your comment here contradicts that description. Something without a mind can't be ordered.

There is no contradiction. This is what I quoted from the Golem section of the D&D wiki:

"Being mindless, they do nothing without orders from their creators. They follow instructions explicitly and are incapable of any strategy or tactics. They are emotionless in combat and cannot be provoked."

That is how they work in D&D. It is how they work in my mud. It is how they work in some (but not all) of the stories based on Jewish folklore, in which "Golems are not intelligent: If commanded to perform a task, they will take the instructions perfectly literally".

I can "order" my computer to perform tasks by giving it instructions, but it will follow those instructions literally, often doing things I didn't intend. Sometimes this can result in some pretty annoying behaviour, but no amount of shouting or kicking will resolve it - my computer is emotionless and cannot be provoked. It will only respond to direct instructions. Being mindless, it does nothing without orders.
01 Aug, 2010, Deimos wrote in the 32nd comment:
Votes: 0
Quoting a paradox that you've taken literally doesn't explain the logical problem. Defer to Occam on this one - what's the simplest explanation? That computers are the only mindless things ever to have existed that can take instructions, or that nothing without a mind can take instructions and the reason that computers can take them is because they have a mind? I'm going with the latter. The former would piss off an entire community of AI researchers, lol.
01 Aug, 2010, KaVir wrote in the 33rd comment:
Votes: 0
You're honestly suggesting that the reason I can program a computer is because it has a mind capable of understanding my instructions? I'm not quite sure how to respond to that, other than to suggest that perhaps you've misunderstood Occam's Razor.
01 Aug, 2010, Lyanic wrote in the 34th comment:
Votes: 0
I use a flag called no_mind for NPCs I want to exhibit mindless behavior. One aspect of that mindless behavior is an inability to be charmed. Any NPC without the no_mind flag is considered to have a mind.


Examples of NPCs with minds: humanoids, bears, cats, sharks, etc

Examples of NPCs without minds: golems, statues, zombies, roses, starfish, etc


While I have no technological NPCs in my game, if I did, I would definitely flag them with no_mind - even computers with advanced AI. In the field of Cognitive Science, behaving intelligently (or even being intelligent) and having a mind are not the same thing. I'd prefer not to start an argument over the nature of the mind, though. That would seriously derail this conversation.
01 Aug, 2010, Deimos wrote in the 35th comment:
Votes: 0
KaVir said:
You're honestly suggesting that the reason I can program a computer is because it has a mind capable of understanding my instructions?

Yes, that's what I'm suggesting. Things without minds can't understand instructions. If it can't perceive, it won't know that you gave it instructions. If it can't reason, it won't know what to do with the instructions. If it can't make decisions, it can't carry out the instructions.

So, do you disagree that a computer has the ability to perceive, reason, and make decisions? Or do you disagree that these properties are required in order to understand and carry out instructions? If you answered yes to either of those questions, then I'm not going to pursue the discussion anymore, since that's just plain silly. :p But, if you answered no to both of them, then the only thing left is that you disagree that a mind is the ability to perceive, reason, and make decisions. If that's the case, then we're only disagreeing on irrelevant semantics, and if it helps, I'll rewrite my premise:

Only things with minds that can perceive, reason, and make decisions should have the ability to be charmed.
01 Aug, 2010, KaVir wrote in the 36th comment:
Votes: 0
The computer reads input and makes decisions, but it does so based on precise computations, following the instructions it's been given. You cannot seduce it, sorry - although you could program it to respond as if you could.
02 Aug, 2010, ATT_Turan wrote in the 37th comment:
Votes: 0
Deimos said:
KaVir said:
You're honestly suggesting that the reason I can program a computer is because it has a mind capable of understanding my instructions?

Yes, that's what I'm suggesting. Things without minds can't understand instructions. If it can't perceive, it won't know that you gave it instructions. If it can't reason, it won't know what to do with the instructions. If it can't make decisions, it can't carry out the instructions.


I know this is another philosophical discussion between you and KaVir, but…SERIOUSLY? The functioning of a computer is, traced back to its most basic level, due to humans figuring out how to manipulate the flow of electric current. Are you saying that your transistors are sentient? If not, at what point did they gain awareness (which is what perception refers to)?

If I know that pushing a domino over will cause it to fall down and I make this, is it aware and making decisions in order to carry out my instruction of "fall over"?

I must now destroy my computer let it become SkyNet.
02 Aug, 2010, Davion wrote in the 38th comment:
Votes: 0
Why would you need to charm a computer? They already do what we tell them to. Sometimes a little more literal then we'd like ;)
02 Aug, 2010, Ssolvarain wrote in the 39th comment:
Votes: 0
I wish I could ask my computer how it's feeling today.

And I wish it would ask me, sometimes.
02 Aug, 2010, Kjwah wrote in the 40th comment:
Votes: 0
Ssolvarain said:
I wish I could ask my computer how it's feeling today.


Can't you ask it?
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